Ides of January

Earlier this year I made myself a sort of half-hearted promise that I would do something to move closer to my goals every day. One day I made a pitch to an editor (and haven’t heard back”, submitted a book review (and haven’t heard back), worked on some block posts, explored avenues for internships or a new job, expressed interest in changing my position at my current job, solidified a concept in the novel I finished this fall and revised the last three chapters to include it, and started a new novel.

I read a memoir. I looked at the other books on my to-be-read pile. Today I finally picked up book one of the Outlander series. I made it to approximately page 150.

I am working six days a week at Target. Yesterday was my regular day off and my next one comes on next Tuesday. I’m volunteering as cookie mom for my daughter’s Girl Scout troop and in a couple weeks my duties as a trustee at Mary Meuser Memorial Library resume.

I helped a friend register her car. Did laundry and dishes and did them again. Finished House MD and really want to do a review of the whole series. Which I loved.

My friends and acquaintances tell me that they didn’t like House MD. Either the medicine got too repetitive or the whole thing felt formulaic. Having seen every episode I disagree. The core characters and the changing supporting characters explore so many everyday struggles. They make you laugh (we rewatched the ‘speed dating’ episode from Season Six tonight) but they also make you consider issues that effect the human psyche. House’s addiction to pain meds. House’s search for his biological father. Cuddy and her desire to be a mom. Taub and his marriage. 

That’s where I’m at.

And the new novel? It’s not really new. It’s the French medic in Algeria story except now I’ve completely gotten her and my existing protagonist intertwined. What I thought was a story that happened between some of my other stories with a cameo by some overlapping characters is now the next logical story in the sequence.

I’m not sure I’m ready for that.